


Pretense

by prepare4trouble



Series: Little By Little [20]
Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dokma Racing, Gambling, Gambling for items rather than money, Gen, Kanan's delicate nose, Visually Impaired Ezra Bridger, Worry, keeping secrets, not for much longer though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-17
Updated: 2017-03-20
Packaged: 2018-10-06 19:19:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10342869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prepare4trouble/pseuds/prepare4trouble
Summary: It won't be long before everybody knows, and that will change everything.  Ezra takes advantage of what might be his last chance to pretend.





	1. Chapter 1

Stupid, stupid, _stupid!_

Ezra thumped himself in the thigh, fist pounding again and again into the same spot every time he repeated the word in his head.

Sabine hadn’t done anything wrong. Okay, yeah, she had _kind_ of mislead him with the ‘code’ she had given him to learn, but if he’d been thinking straight at the time, he would have put it together on his own. And once he had read the name of the file on the data card and realized what she had tasked him with, he had actually kept reading. Maybe not with the same enthusiasm, but if Sabine thought it was important, he had been willing to give it a try.

She had been trying to help, and now he had thrown it back in her face.

Stupid, stupid, _stupid!_

It was Sato he was angry with, really. Sato, who had grounded him for _no reason at all_ , without even having a proper understanding of what was going on; without listening to reason and letting him explain that he was perfectly… fine. He _was_ fine. For now. And okay, yeah, if one day he _wasn’t_ fine, if he couldn’t learn the things that Kanan was going to try to teach him, if he thought that he would be putting anybody in danger, then of course he shouldn’t be on missions. But now?

He raised a hand, the one that he had been using to thump his poor, blameless leg, and placed it to the side of his face, then moved it forward slowly, eyes directly ahead, waiting for the moment that it came into view. It wasn’t so bad. Reading wasn’t necessary for missions, and if it went dark, well, he could make sure he had a flashlight. He was fine.

Hera would fix it.

Only, would she? She had more chance than he did, that was for sure, but the decision was ultimately Sato’s, and he knew for a fact that if Sato made a decision, Hera would stick to it.

Maybe he shouldn’t have mentioned it to her. Just carried on as normal, taken himself on the next mission, and hoped that Sato forgot to mention it to her. Only, that would have made everything worse when it eventually had come out.

Stupid Sato.

Stupid Zeb too, with his stupid spider hunt. He didn't even know why that annoyed him, but it did.

Ezra lifted his hands to his face again, but this time rested his head in his hands and tried to resist the urge to groan loudly.

“Hey, what’cha doing?”

The voice came from nowhere. He allowed himself a second further to massage his brow with his fingertips before turning to face the speaker. It was Hobbie, with a curious smile on his face, head tilted slightly to one side in apparent concern. Ezra hadn’t seen him approach.

It wasn’t because of his eyes. It was because he had been distracted, looking at other things. Honestly, the guy could have approached from right in front of him, and he wouldn't have noticed him until he spoke. At least, he thought that was the case.

Of course, the reason he was distracted in the first place _was_ because of his eyes, but he wasn’t going to think about that.

Stupid eyes.

Well, no. Stupid eye condition. The eyes themselves were the innocent victims, and he didn’t want to accidentally think anything that might make them give up any sooner.

Okay, that was a ridiculous thing to be thinking.

“Ezra?”

Hobbie had taken a step closer and was looking at him with definite concern now.

“You okay?”

Not even close. He rubbed his hands briskly over his face then smiled in Hobbie’s direction. “Great, yeah. Just, uh…” he hesitated. Did Hobbie know? He couldn't detect any hint of sympathy in his voice. His concern for Ezra appeared to be limited to the fact that he had been sitting there with his head in his hands; there was no awkwardness, no hesitancy. No pity. A wave of relief washed over him. “Just got a headache,” he finished.

“You should go see the med droid,” Hobbie suggested.

That was the _last_ thing he wanted to do. He shook his head. “It’ll go on its own,” he said. “Already fading, actually.” That was a lie, because in actual fact the beginnings of a non-fictitious headache were beginning to creep up the back of his skull. It didn’t feel like the usual ones, the ones from trying to force himself to see things that were becoming increasingly more difficult. It was probably just the day he was having. From the moment Sabine and Zeb had arrived home yesterday, he could honestly say that not one thing had gone right for him.

And now he had gone and shouted at Sabine for no reason, because he was stupid. Stupid, stupid, _stupid!_

“Ezra?”

“I’m fine,” he said.

Hobbie looked at him like he thought he was anything but. “If you’re sure. Well, I’m gonna go, I’m on my way to a briefing, but dokma races tonight? I’m gonna win back that helmet.”

Could he? Ezra grinned instinctively. “Not likely, you don’t get to win the things I don’t bet with. But hey, if you want me to take some more of your stuff, I’ll see you there.”

Well, if he decided he couldn't face it, there was always the headache excuse to fall back on.

Of course, in the hours between now and then, Hobbie and the others could have found out, and he wouldn't know until he showed up and someone said something. But that was going to happen sooner or later anyway, better to get it over with, right?

Right?

“Great, see you later then,” Hobbie said, and turned to leave. Ezra watched him go.

That had been a mistake. Now he was either going to have to go whether he felt like it or not, or lie the next time he saw Hobbie. And by the time either of those things happened, he wasn’t going to know whether Hobbie had heard the circulating rumors.

Maybe he’d be able to deflect by talking about Kanan’s delicate nose?

Unlikely.

Stupid dokma races. Stupid Hobbie.

Stupid, stupid, _stupid!_ He thumped himself in the leg again, and winced hard. Leg thumping was also stupid.

As was everything about this whole situation, actually.

He needed to apologize to Sabine.

But not now. He couldn’t face it now; he needed to work up to it, plan out what he was going to say.

When had it stopped being _easy_? Talking to them. He had never had to plan things out before. Everything was changing, and he didn’t like it.

The headache was getting worse, increasing in intensity. What he needed right now, was to lie down in a dark room. Unfortunately, a dark room was also the _last_ thing he needed, or wanted.

Two painkillers and ignore it, then.

Yep, this was all going great.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “So…” Hobbie said. Ezra tore himself away from the group at the other side of the track, now talking animatedly and not appearing to pay him any attention. “I heard a rumor today.”

They called it racing, and technically Ezra supposed the name was accurate. The dokma were placed at one end of what was laughingly called the track -- it had been constructed out of spare parts, and consisted of a piece of metal several meters long with steep sides welded on to deter the creatures from trying to leave -- and the first one to make it to the other side was declared the winner.

Where the whole ‘race’ concept fell down was the point where the dokma, somewhat predictably, refused to stay in the lanes that had been drawn in stripes down the track, choosing instead to meander back and forth, completely disregarding the lane they have been allocated. Not only that, but they were as likely to go backwards as forwards, and there was a good chance that your chosen snail would decide to do nothing at all, and simply stay where it had been put, as though it was above the whole idea of racing.

The creatures weren’t particularly fast, but they could move at a reasonable pace when they wanted to. Unfortunately, they didn’t want to. At least, not once they had been placed in the racetrack, anyway.

Ezra had a theory that they were doing it on purpose; they were more intelligent than the base personnel gave them credit for, and they took their revenge for the week or so of captivity by doing what they could to make the races uninteresting. That, or they figured the more useless they were, the more quickly they were likely to be released again to do whatever it was that dokma did when they weren’t wandering aimlessly in the wrong direction.

“Hey, you made it!”

Hobbie’s voice came from behind him, and he turned to see the pilot standing alone, a short distance away, a hand raised in greeting. Ezra waved back and gave him a half-hearted smile as the pilot wandered over.

As he approached, Hobbie made a show of looking Ezra up and down searchingly. “I’m not seeing my helmet anywhere,” he said.

Ezra felt himself release a little of the tension he had been carrying; there was nothing in his friend’s voice or his actions that implied that he knew anything was amiss. Apparently things didn’t spread as quickly as Kanan had implied they might. That, or Hobbie was a good actor. The guy had spent a chunk of time in the Imperial Academy without raising suspicions that his sympathies lay elsewhere. He knew how to act normal when he was feeling anything but.

Well, he wasn’t the only one that knew how to pretend. Ezra affected a smile and an expressive shrug, “Why would I bet _my_ new helmet? I’d have to be an idiot to risk losing something like that.” At Hobbie’s scowl, Ezra’s smile widened into a grin.

He directed his attention to the racetrack, still empty at the moment, where someone had optimistically put a blob of paint at the start of each lane, denoting which color-coded snail should go in which lane.

“They caught new dokma for tonight,” Hobbie told him. “There’s been a lot more of them around recently, have you noticed? So they decided to swap them a few days early. The ones I’ve seen around the base all look pretty eager to get someplace too, so hopefully these guys’ll be in the mood to run.” 

Run. As if any of them had ever done that. But now that Hobbie mentioned it, there did seem to be a few more of the creatures around the place. He had almost tripped over two of them crossing his path that afternoon. “Yeah, stranger things have happened,” he agreed. “Not often, but probably, somewhere.”

Ezra made a quick visual sweep of the crowd, searching for friends and familiar faces. It was early still, and there weren’t many people gathered yet. More would have arrived by the second race. If they were very lucky and one of the snails decided to meander in the right direction a little sooner than average, they might even get a third race out of them. He recognized everybody present, but none of them were what he would describe as friends.

Against his will, he found himself wondering for how long he would be able to do that; scan a crowd in that way for a friend, or a room for a missing object, a racetrack for a winning snail. He shut down the thought as soon as he noticed it, but it was too late, the damage to his mood was already done.

At the other side of the track, someone caught his eye; their gazes locked automatically, frozen in a long second of eye contact before the other person, a human man, perhaps in his late twenties looked away, suddenly appearing very interested in his own fingernails. An uneasy feeling began to stir somewhere inside Ezra’s chest.

“So…” Hobbie said. Ezra tore himself away from the group at the other side of the track, now talking animatedly and not appearing to pay him any attention. “I heard a rumor today.”

Ezra froze, caught out by the casual tone, the amused grin on Hobbie’s face. Did he not believe it? Did he think it was just that, a rumor and nothing more? And if so, how was Ezra supposed to proceed? He couldn’t laugh it off with him, lying to his face only for Hobbie to find out over the next few days that it was true. But he wasn’t sure he would be able to bring himself to confirm it either.

He folded his arms and tried to look casual. He was suddenly very aware of his own heartbeat and despite the slight chill in the night air, he could feel the sweat forming on his brow. “Oh?” he said, and to his surprise, his voice sounded relaxed and disinterested. But, did he sound _too_ disinterested? Surely he should be interested in a rumor that Hobbie seemed to find funny. Was he giving himself away?

It didn’t matter. As soon as Hobbie said it, he was going to have to tell him it was true; it was that or say nothing at all, and that would be basically the same as confirming it anyway. Anything less than a straight denial was a confirmation.

Hobbie’s smile widened as he started to speak. Ezra looked away, but he could still hear the grin in his friend’s voice. “Someone told me Zeb wandered back into the base dripping with krykna blood this afternoon,” he explained. “So firstly, is that true? And secondly, if it is, what’s _that_ about?”

Relief washed over him like a wave, followed by a few tiny ripples of disappointment. He didn’t _want_ to have to talk about it, but at least if he got it out of the way it would be done with, he wouldn't be waiting any more for someone to ask the question. He could confirm it to Hobbie, give him permission to spread the information, then go to bed. Wake up the next morning to find it everywhere. Nobody able to look him in the eye, awkwardness following him around like a cloud.

“Ezra?”

Hobbie was frowning now, mild concern in his expression. Ezra forced out a laugh. “Uh, yeah. He…” He had no idea what Zeb had been thinking, but he had a sneaking suspicion that it was his fault. “I think he was just having that kind of a day,” he said.

Hobbie laughed too. “Gotta say, I have _never_ had the kind of day where I’ve thought ‘that’s it, I’m heading off to fight a giant spider.’ Things just never _get_ that bad.”

“Zeb’s… kind of unique,” Ezra told him, relaxing into the direction of the conversation now. “Those things smell worse on the inside than the outside though, if you can believe it. Poor Kanan, I don’t know how he could stand it. Have you heard about how sensitive his sense of smell is?” He grinned, pleased with himself for turning the conversation around to that particular topic. Two different rumors about two different members of the Ghost crew was more than enough for one night. Surely there wasn’t room for people to be whispering about Ezra too.

Hobbie frowned. “It is? Huh. Well I guess that makes sense, since he can’t see.” He paused, mulling things over. “I can’t imagine that,” he said quietly. Then, before Ezra had the opportunity to react, he appeared to catch a glimpse of someone out of the corner of his eye.

Ezra turned to see who was coming, as Hobbie waved at two approaching figures.

Ezra tried not to squint. The light was fading, and although the artificial lights illuminated the immediate area well, further away, the view faded into almost nothing. It didn’t matter, he would find out when they arrived anyway.

It was Wedge, and another pilot, a woman he had seen around but didn’t really know. He smiled his way through a greeting, and again, nobody appeared to know anything. Someone called for final bets, and the dokma were placed on the track.

“Got anything riding on this?” Wedge asked him. 

Ezra shrugged. “Nothing important, like a helmet or anything.” He shot a glance at Hobbie to check whether he was taking the bait, but got no noticeable reaction. He had bet a couple of ration bars on blue, but from where he was standing, and in the artificial light, he was having trouble telling the blue from the green. Neither were anywhere near the finish line.

“So, I heard about Zeb,” Wedge began.

He really didn’t want to do that again; dancing around the edge of the truth, pretending not to know the reason for Zeb’s odd behavior. “Yeah,” he said. “Lots of rumors flying around tonight.”

That was stupid. Confirm it to one person, halfway-deny it to another. That was a good way to make everyone think you’re losing your mind.

He became aware of Wedge looking at him strangely, and turned away, pretending not to notice and focussing all of his attention on the events on the track. The red snail was already pulling away from the rest of the group, maybe Hobbie’s theory that they would be in the mood to run was correct after all; unless it decided to stop and turn around, it was going to win. It was causing some excitement at the other side of the track, where two engineers were leaning over and screaming encouragement.

Whatever was drawing Red to the finish line was having no effect on the other snails, however, three of which appeared to be trying to climb the sheer sides of the track. He had _never ___seen them do that before.

“Oh…kay then. Hey, I also heard there’s a new batch come out of the still,” Wedge told him. “Supposed to be the best one yet, but they’re not sharing it yet.”

When this race was over, he was going to call it a night. He didn’t feel like hanging around for the next one. Predictably, the red snail had stopped moving forward and meandered off to the right. It seemed to be taking an interest in whatever the others were doing, several feet behind it. The engineers’ cheers had turned to curses.

“What’s up with you tonight?”

Ezra turned to him in surprise. Was it that obvious? He had thought he was doing okay. He opened his mouth, but his instinct was to deny there was anything wrong. He couldn’t do that. Sooner or later, Wedge, and everyone else, was going to hear. When they did, he didn’t want them thinking he was a liar. “I…” he said.

Wedge was looking at him expectantly. Sensing something happening, Hobbie had moved a little closer, bringing a small crowd with him.

He couldn’t just come out and say it. It had been bad enough the first few times, planned out, and with Kanan there to back him up if it got too hard. He sighed. “You’ll probably hear about it sooner or later anyway. I don’t want to…” he stopped as his throat seized unexpectedly, strangling the words as he tried to form them. He forced himself to swallow. “Not now, okay?”

There was a sudden silence as the group of pilots exchanged glances, then looked back at him.

“Is everyone okay?” Wedge demanded. “Did something happen? I haven’t seen Sabine around today, is she…”

“No, she’s fine. It’s not that,” Ezra assured him quickly.

Wedge looked even more curious. “Not _that_. So, it’s _something_ , then?”

“No… yes…” Ezra stammered. “I don’t…” _want to do this now._ He forced himself to smile, and ignored the question. He glanced over at the racetrack. “Looks like I’m going to lose,” he said.

Wedge glanced over too. “Yeah, I bet on green,” he said glumly. They fell into silence for a few moments, before Wedge looked over at Hobbie. “Do you know what’s going on with him?” he asked.

“Hey,” Ezra said, affecting a grin that really hoped looked genuine. “Of course he doesn’t, I’m a mystery.”

“Did you get yourself in trouble with Captain Syndulla?” Wedge tried.

It occurred to him that it would have been better to just deny anything was wrong, and apologize later for lying if they called him on it. Now, apparently, Wedge wasn’t going to stop digging until he got to the bottom of that mystery.

Ezra took a step backward before he even realized what he was doing. He shook his head. “No, it’s n…”

“Kanan, then?”

“Hey, that’s enough, back off,” said someone to his left. Ezra did; he took another step backward away from the group, but his escape bid was stopped by a hand on the shoulder. He turned to look, and saw that it was Hobbie. He hadn’t even noticed him move. “He doesn’t want to talk about it, maybe we should respect that, huh?

Ezra shot him a relieved glance. His friend was standing next to him now, having broken off from the rest of the group, his arms folded as he attempted to stare them down. Something about that pulled Ezra out of the panic that had been beginning to descend. He took a deep breath and grinned widely, cockily. “Yeah,” he said, with a confidence that he didn’t feel. He imitated Hobbie’s defensive pose, “Respect that.”

Apparently sensing they weren’t going to get any gossip that way, the group slowly began to dissipate. Ezra glanced over at the ‘race’. Red was still in the lead, but it appeared to be traveling in the wrong direction now. He wasn’t sure, it wasn’t moving fast, and from where he stood, he couldn’t tell which way it was heading, or much other than the vague shape of the creature and the red smear on its shell. He turned to Hobbie.

“I could have handled it,” he said.

Hobbie shrugged. “I know. I just thought you might enjoy not having that go on for an hour before they gave up. Wedge is… he’s really really good at getting to the bottom of things. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just not fun to be the one with the secret.”

Ezra wrapped his arms around his body. “It’s not really a secret anymore,” he said. “It’ll be everywhere in a few days. I just don’t want to talk about it.”

Hobbie looked at him searchingly. Ezra could tell that he wanted to ask, but managed to restrain himself. Ezra relaxed incrementally.

“For the record,” Hobbie told him, “this is making me very nervous.”

Ezra glanced over at the track, but something else caught his eye instead. He squinted slightly to make sure he was seeing what he thought. Wandering over in their direction, a cup of drink in his hand, was the kid that had stopped to him earlier that day. The one that had struck up a conversation about his dad, and his vision problems.

A stab of panic struck him unexpectedly at the sight. He glanced around quickly from side to side, but there was nobody else around that the kid he could be heading toward. He was going to do it again. He was going to blunder into saying something that would let everyone… no. No, he was stopping, talking to someone else.

Only, wasn’t that worse? What were they talking about? A vague sense of worry gnawed at him, and while he doubted the kid was intentionally spreading rumors, he didn’t like not knowing what he was saying. 

The woman he was speaking to glanced briefly in his direction and Ezra felt himself shrink back. Could be nothing. Probably just a coincidence. Could be something.

“I’m gonna go,” he said. “It’s getting a bit late anyway, and… yeah.” He didn’t bother with a better excuse. Probably they were just talking, but if there was a chance that the topic of conversation was going to switch to him, he didn’t want to be around for it. Just the presence of someone that knew…

This was going to get easier. Once everyone knew, he wouldn't have to worry about them finding out. That had to be a good thing. Even if it really didn’t feel like it now. But if anything the kid was potentially doing him a favor.

“It’s not late,” Hobbie told him. He was right too, it wasn’t early, but late was a huge exaggeration. “Anyway, you bet on this race. If you leave, you forfeit, even if your snail wins.”

it didn’t matter. He had to go. He wasn’t going to win anyway, his snail was right at the back joining in the escape bid. Or somewhere in the middle. Either way, he wasn’t going to win this one. He shrugged. “Hey, it’s fine, at least _my_ helmet’s safe.”

Hobbie scowled. “I’m getting that back,” he said.

“Not tonight,” Ezra promised him, and with a final glance at the kid that knew, he turned and fled, keeping to the well-lit areas of the base, despite the long route it forced him to take.

**Author's Note:**

> ♥ ♡ ♥ Comments are loved ♥ ♡ ♥


End file.
